To understand developmental change in perceived control we need to understand how children, adolescents, and adults make judgments about contingency. Is there reliable developmental change in the extent to which people perceive events in their environment as contingent on variations in human characteristics or behavior? To begin answering this question, two studies are proposed. In the first, kindergarten, fourth grade, ninth grade, and college students will take part in a card game in which outcomes are totally chance determined. By chance, about half the subjects at each grade level will draw a winning card often enough to win a prize; about half will not win. Afterward, all will be asked to make various judgments and predictions regarding the performance of others on the task. These judgments and predictions are designed to reveal, in subtle ways, the degree to which the noncontingent card task is perceived as contingent. Analyses will focus on the role of age and "self-serving bias" in shaping contingency judgments. In Study II, children, adolescents, and their parents will be interviewed following performance of chance activities at the North Carolina State Fair. Once again, requests for judgments and predictions will be designed to reveal perceived contingency. Analyses will focus on the role of age, task, and winnings (i.e., whether the participant scored a "win" or not) in judgments about contingency. In addition, Study II will permit a search for relations between children's contingency judgments and the beliefs of their parents. Overall, the program of research is designed to balance laboratory control with naturalistic cross-validation. The research has significant implications for the study of achievement attributions, clinical phenomena (e.g., grief and guilt), and social judgments (e.g., the "just world" hypothesis).